Death
by Vampy Sparda
Summary: There is nothing harder to deal with than death. As he held her body, he felt her crimson life flow through his fingers...
1. Murder

A/N : Angst, angst, drama, drama. This came to me while I was -trying- to fall asleep last night. It really touched me, so I wrote the thought out, and it turned into this.

* * *

_The last that ever she saw him  
Carried away by a moonlight shadow  
He passed on worried and warning  
Carried away by a moonlight shadow.  
Lost in a river last saturday night  
Far away on the other side.  
He was caught in the middle of a desperate fight  
And she couldn't find how to push through..._

_Moonlight Shadow by Mike Oldfield_

* * *

How…? How could this have possibly happened?

He held her body close to his, his cheek touching hers. Why? How could someone murder the one thing that mattered?

He could feel her crimson blood flowing softly through his tense fingers, surrounding them in a pool. His pants and shirt were soaked, but it was of no matter. No material thing could matter now…

Her soft eyes were closed, and her full lips parted slightly. She was still beautiful, so how? How did you kill Beauty herself? Even he, as what he was, could kill such a holy woman. Holy in spirit, not in body. How could someone do what he had thought was undoable? How? How? How?

No… he couldn't think that way. She was still alive! Her chest heaved with obvious effort and blood bubbled and frothed from her lips. Her pale skin was so easily stained with her own fluids. He kissed her, despite the blood, despite the pain and hurt he felt. This was the first… no, only second. This pain was old, familiar, and he hated it. He cursed every god there was under the sun, and it never made the pain easier. Not even giving the same pain he felt flowing through his fingers made him feel better.

He brushed hair from her face that was sticking from the sweat pouring from her. The effort to stay alive… it was killing her. A cruel irony and he could do nothing but hold her weak, depleted body.

She coughed again, and her whole small frame shook with the effort, and even more blood pumped out. God, was there ever an end to the blood? Please, keep her alive… please… he would not be able to handle her loss… the only love… no…

He could feel the tears sliding down his chiseled face, and see them drip onto her round, child-like one. She had been such a tomboy, with her beautiful heart-shaped face and her competitive nature…

He didn't even bother to wipe the tears away. He just slowly, shaking, brushed her sullen face, smoothing his finger down the contours of her face, the other hand buried in her thick hair. She still smelled like honey, even as the smell of blood overpowered the environment.

She finally gained consciousness, and he could see her open her eyes behind thick lashes. She looked up at his face with love, through dulled eyes. She was crying. God, even now… she was crying.

Her lips parted again, as she struggled for words. "…love…" she choked out, before another coughing fit. She recovered fast, determined to get the words out. "I… love… you…"

It was like a pang to his heart, a silver-blade into his cold soul. The words were so beautiful. He could not ever remember hearing them before, but he must have. Even now, he remembered them.

"I'll always love you." He said, his voice miraculously as it always was; low and monotonic. But she knew he meant it, he just always sounded like that. His voice was that of a trained aristocrat, just like his features. As if chiseled by a master sculptor. Perfect like a Roman statue.

She reached behind him, and he complied, handing her the object. She had always said she wanted to die with it in her arms. Then she would joke and say he had damn well better be there too. He was more important. She didn't want to die with him in her arms, because that would mean he was dead too, and she could not bear the thought.

Who would've thought their love would even have blossomed? Such a strange, opposite pair they were. But, as they say, it had been a match made it heaven. Fire and ice, sun and the moon… they were born to hate, and destined to love.

"Goodbye." She said softly, through the red froth, and her eyes dimmed to a gray, leaving him alone. He tucked his head in her neck, breathing in her smell. He was torn apart of course, but his heart… it had turned him numb. His true emotions… if he felt them now, he would fall dead by her side.

"You will always be my angel." He said, and shut her eyelids gently, the blue and red eyes never to open again. Never to see herself in a mirror, or him on their bed, waiting for her eagerly. He tugged at his midnight vest, now soaked in her life. He cried again, silently. He stood up, towering over her, her body perfect in every way. She had been ashamed of her scars… but they were so beautiful. He had been ashamed of his tears… but now they flowed freely. Who was around to care? God himself could be watching and he would still just cry. What should he care of God? God had done this to him… he would always curse his name…

He looked down at her body, the only person he had ever cared about outside his family. She had died fighting, like she wanted to, the murder weapon thrown yards away in his anger. She had died holding on to her mother, the Kalina Ann wrapped in her tiny arms that had been full of strength. The large gun was as tall as her… should he make it her grave marker? Who would have thought he could think these things, looking down at her pale, dead body, and not have his own heart burst under his coat?

How would he live without her? Now, the grief was gone. But what would happen when it came back? She would've said not to worry about it. She had lived life moment by moment, and he had always planned ahead. So different, yet so alike. He would try to live, for her. She would have wanted to that. Not to dwell on the past? It sounded so easy, and hurt so much.

"Goodbye Mary, my angel, my Lady."

Vergil silently walked away.


	2. Discovery

A/N: Alright, so one chapter wasn't enough angst for the muses. They demanded I continue, so I did. There should be one more chapter to this to finish it off.

**Laryna6:** Yes, I was trying to allude to Sparda/Eva, I'm glad someone picked up on that. And I do like keeping an air of mystery in the fics... thank you!  
**Alcapacien:** Eheh, thanks. I re-read it and I kept thinking I made Vergil a cry-baby, but then I remembered I didn't care.  
**PoutyKitten:** Aww, I used to be like that when I first visited I really hated reviewing, but I got over that eventually. And don't worry, there's a steady supply of these coming. The plot bunnies ATTACK! Thanks for the cute review! It made me smile.  
**Veronica & The Tyrant Hamster:** I'm glad you both liked it. You guys always help me write more!  
**Sam Valentine, Bustahead, kkkd, AnalisDestiny, and Yasmine:** I'm glad you all liked it (and that it made a few of you cry!). Thank you for all of your wonderful comments.

And thanks to anyone else who read this! Now, on with Part 2!

* * *

The day was old and the night was young. Sunset had just begun, painting the sky a slew of colors, chasing away the blue of the day. It was a nice day to live. A nice day to die.

It was a cloudless sky, and the faint echo of stars was starting to appear. The sky seemed empty, however, as it became darker. A new moon tonight. Just stars, alone in the night sky. But who really cared, nowadays? No one notices little things like the sky. In a city as big as this one, no one has time for second thoughts. A small, busy little city that was crawling with people during the day and completely devoid of life at night.

Well, _human_ life, at least. The horror stories that were passed down through the ages always had truth in them. Demons, monsters, ghosts, witches…. They always come out when the sun is gone. And that's why Vergil was out here in the dark, alone, traveling along deserted roads. He was waiting for the demons to appear.

He looked up at the dead sign of _Devil May Cry_.

The building was in shambles. No one had been there in years. A shame, really. When it had still been in business, Dante had taken such good care of it. Almost like a child to him.

Although the blood that splattered the walls from his collected heads was a _bit_ distasteful. Of course, Vergil had always found Dante to be vulgar. Booze, girls, sex… that's what his twin had been about.

"_I'm absolutely crazy about it!"_

He had always been most compassionate about his business of hunting devils, though. Nothing ever took priority.

For most of his life, anyways.

All because of the loss of their mother. It had never been for father, really. Not in the early years. For some reason, Dante had always denied the existence of their father. Was it because Dante felt Sparda had abandoned them? Abandoned Mother? Vergil's brother had told him how he had walked in on Eva sitting alone on her bed, crying silently. She never liked to cry in front of her children. But after the loss of Sparda, maybe she had stopped caring. Not for her children, of course. But for her modesty and pride. Or maybe she had never seen the young devil walk in on her, because he had always silently closed the door and left.

That's when Dante had started hating Sparda. When he realized that the demon had hurt her, hurt Mother. But he, being a child, did not understand why Sparda was gone. He never tried to understand.

But it would be soon, now. He could faintly hear growls echoing from down the darkened road.

Then a ping in his head told him this was the moment.

"Come out. Don't lurk in the shadows like some lowly creature."

And he did come out, power radiating off of him in blood-red waves. His leathery wings rustled behind him, folded up tightly against his back. Red scales covered his reptilian body, black claws clicking on the cement.

"A son of Sparda, reduced to savaging. What would Father say?"

Dante growled in response to that hated name. Vergil wasn't surprised, really. Even in this state, that name invoked hatred.

Vergil laid a hand on the hilt of the Yamato, as Dante flexed his black-clawed hands. "See what has happened to you, Dante? You rejected your demonic blood, and it decided to take over. Why didn't you accept it like I had?"

There really was no point in talking to the beast, but Vergil continued anyways. He wanted the shell of his brother to know why he was going to do this.

The demon grinned at him. "Theboy was weak." It spoke in a gravelly voice, very different from his familiar twin's. Obviously, the demon in his blood had become its own personality.

Vergil thumbed the hilt of his sword, clicking it out of the sheath, ready to be drawn. "He may have been ignorant, but he was not weak. No son of Sparda is weak." Vergil may have once been willing to kill his brother, but by all means, he had never hated him. It was more like… envy. He had always believed Eva loved Dante more than himself. But it didn't matter anymore, not really. She was long dead and not even her clone could copy her love. "You never did understand why I wanted power, dear brother."

"Your brother exists no longer," the demon said, shuffling his wings as he stroke a claw down his stomach. "He has given up; gone to sleep. Submitted to me. I was the one who killed your lover. That is why you are here, are you not?"

The question made Vergil's jaw tick. He had since then tried to numb his emotions, and it had worked, by all means. He no longer felt anything, like before when he had been so keen on gaining power.

"You know," the demon started, circling Vergil, "he wanted her too. Thought of ravishing her all the time, stealing her away from you. He never understood how his cold-hearted brother had roped the heart of such a girl, and why he had been so keen on keeping it."

"He thought that about every woman he saw." Vergil replied softly.

"The boy had a particular interest in her," The demon began. "That's how I got into him, really. His obsession over how you had beaten him, how you beat him in everything. But particularly how she fell in love," – he said the last word with obvious disgust – "with a dead-hearted hybrid like you. He never understood."

This time the Yamato was in his hand, the silver glinting dully under the streetlights. The demon's eyes glowed red. "Tell me one thing…" he was still speaking softly, but his heart had become full of rage from this damned demon's taunting. How could Dante have given up? He had never let something get him down, he had never given up. "Why did you give in, Dante?"

The demon laughed and flexed its claws again, ready for bloodshed. "He couldn't resist because he denied my existence. I drove him insane." And he shot a claw forward, ripping into Vergil's shoulder easily before he could make a move. In direct response, Vergil wrapped his back leg around the demon's front one, locking him close to his body. He turned and drove Yamato through the demon's shoulder, blood trickling in a fast stream down the blade.

"Why don't you let your own demon out?" the soulless body of his brother leaned close, breath tickling Vergil's face.

Vergil gave a small smirk. "I don't need help to finish you off."

The demon scraped his hand down Vergil's stomach, slicing through cloth and flesh with a paper-ripping sound. "Denying your demon, too?" He grinned, and a forked tongue shot out and back in.

The wounds mended easily enough since they were merely scratches, but it still took some of Vergil's energy to do so.

"Now what kind of brother would I be if I let the other side of me do all the work? If I must kill Dante, I will do it with honor." And he brought his left foot up to the demon's chest, kicking off and slinging Yamato out of that scaly skin, blood splattering the street in a wide arc.

The two combatants turned to face each other, staring each other down with confidence. In a mirror-like gesture, they both charged at the same time, and the fight had officially begun.


End file.
